News Ultra high-end graphics are "a terrible mistake"

Sales? Once again, your an ignorant baffoon:

http://www.tomsgames.com/us/2008/02/21/gdc_will_steam_add_movies_music/

Orange box sold more on Pc then ALL CONSOLES COMBINED.
http://wrapper.ign.com/s?from=http:...R.: 1.65 Million Copies Sold - Voodoo Extreme

Staker - 1.65 million.

Crysis already at 1.4 million.

Stardock games continue to make games that sell very well.

U need to educate yourself, NDP sales are not accurate, Valve does not have an issue with PC gaming and its sales, neither does GSC gameworld, or CDproject.

People at epic prefer consoles so they can sell their engine on them for 5 years, on PC it has already been surpassed. It is nothing more then greed and console bias in the media.

http://www.tomsgames.com/us/2008/02/20/gdc_long_live_pc_gaming/

PC gaming grew a lot last year, prejected more this year.

Ignorant much?

 

Steve_MCG, thank you, this incorrect myth that u need to spend a fortune for a good PC is a lack of education or understanding about hardware. PC hardware is so cheap now, i can build a PC more powerful then the 360 for 6-700 bucks. That is why i think he is lying about his PC, because anyone with a PC like that would know the diffference.

PC is about to do things no console can dream of, it is now 2008, hardware is cheaper and more powerful then ever. Epic does make a good point about intel, they have hurt the casual market on PC, but the part about tri-sli is BS, it is aimed at the very hard core enthusiast, it isn't like they don't make other cards for much cheaper that are still able to play games on high settings.

 

yeah but look at it objectively. you say £150 for a graphics card. thats in addition to your base system which really shouldn't be a slouch for, say, crysis. all in you're looking at minimum about £700 for a decent system, box only, which is good for, max, 2 years of medium-high quality gaming.

my xbox cost me £200 with 2 games and two controllers. my HDTV cost me £200. Live subscription £20 off ebay, and games £20 a pop second hand. This is good for 4 years at the least, and you are guaranteed a consistent visual quality, no faffing with detail settings or drivers, no e-peen envy as your system slowly ages (i've been there...). hell, it even doubles as an HTPC and plays my DVDs.

"BUT!", you say, "the PC can be used for productivity!" well, yeah, but what does the average user use a PC for? internet and email? maybe word proc? get a dell for £200 and you're still under.

don't get me wrong - i LIKE PC gaming - i frequently play TF2 and it's in my top 5 games of all times. it's just, not economically viable FOR MOST PEOPLE. which is why it's so overshadowed by consoles.

oh look, i haven't even mentioned the plug and play simplicity of consoles either. no, i'm not stupid, i can set my PC up (again, i'm a software engineer people, back off), but most people, to put it bluntly, are.

and please don't call me a fanboy, ever.

bootnote: we are not the average user. our perspective is skewed.

 

The problem as I see it is that because Nvidia/AMD have innovated and created super-high-end solutions (which may, or may not be bad, depending on your opinion)... Intel's integrated graphics are still as bad as they have ever been. This means that the gap between the highest of the high end and the lowest of the low end has increased - that's undoubtedly the case.

I think that Sweeney is right in many respects, but what he's wrong on is that PC gaming is dead. I don't agree with that at all, but I do agree that the ultra high-end solutions are a problem for developers because the low-end has not moved.

HOWEVER, what I do know is that Nvidia (and AMD to an extent too) are trying to get developers to not develop with Intel Integrated in mind. And that's for casual gaming as well - not just the next Crysis, Stalker, etc.

Sweeney seems to think that Intel integrated needs to still be developed for, but I frankly believe things need to move on - even Intel realises that if you want to game, you need a discrete GPU from ATI (they don't like to refer to ATI as AMD) or Nvidia.

 

good for 4 years, graphics suck for the last 2. Consoles are good for 5 years, but the graphics look dated after a couple and your stuck with it. Also, the days of consoles games not having bugs are long gone, see MLB 2K7 or 2K8, Mass effect and its frame rate issues, Bully and its load of bugs. So much for guaranted performance on consoles. Dark Messiah elements runs like crap on consoles.

Don't know why your arguing popularity or being overshadowed, PC gaming was never a popular or main stream platform, welcome to 1999.

Pc is more expensive, whats your point? it does more and has better hardware, and sales are fine. Consoles being mroe popular means what? Consoles have been more popular since the early 90's. Popularity just means cheaper, mass produced, dumbed down for the masses, hardly means better now does it. So what is your point? PC has never been nor will be as popularm it is a smaller market. The games cost 20 bucks more on console, if u buy 20-30 games, that is an extra 2-300 bucks for a console, if u a smart when it comes to buying your hardware, PC is not much more expensive, and can do more.

How can anyone with a straight face compare prices? A console does one thing, a PC does virtually everything, so comparing price without mentioning this is ignorant, of course it is more expensive, u get much more for the money.

 

leper, you're not even reading my posts. i refuse to continue this discussion with you.

 

I am, you have no valid points so you pull the " I am not discussing this anymore". I thought u said sales were bad? Pc gaming is doing fine. The only real point Sweeney had was integrated graphics, they are garbage, that is a mistake, Intel need to do whats right and drop the integrated crap. MS should never have allowed vista to run on it. Other then that though, I failt to see any real issue, except piracy.

Pc gaming never was for the average user, it has alays been an niche market, what's your point? It still is doing fine, and actually growing.

 

Epic Games speak like they were the highest game studio, yet they whine for everything, is not our fault some companies can release optimized games, is not our fault UT3 sucked, some companies have done a great job at games on pc (CoD4, Orange Box etc)
and they don''t do this kind of ******** on press release, I understand not everyone has money to arm a high-end pc, but some are
passionated for pc and do whatever it cost to have what they always wanted to, ppl always have the choice to get a console instead, as for epic game you guys are tiring the pc gamers community by first saying their a not considering making games for pc or stated pc is dying and now this, if you really not making any games for pcs fine, but do all us a favor shut up and leave...

 

I am really sick of epic making the PC look bad to the average console fanboy so they can troll on the froums with a weekly PC is in shambles Speech. Make better games Epic, they will sell well on PC. It seems Epic is no longer a Great developr on PC with devs liek Valve, Crytek, so they can go to the console where they have less competition and sell their AA less engine for 5 years.

 

http://www.tomsgames.com/us/2008/02/20/gdc_long_live_pc_gaming/

Epic and others need to stop whining and understand the PC market is not the same as console. Games that sell well on console many pc gamers find boring, or could care less about. We don't want console ports, we want real Pc games. It is refreshing to see some devs really do get it like in the article above.

 

What the hell??

BURN ALL THE PLATFORM TRAITORS!

 

Lepermessiah, plz learn to use the EDIT button!

 

I totally agree with you. I bought a new rig with 2GB, an E6600 and an 8800GTX for Stalker almost a year ago and it's beginning to struggle at my native res of 1360x768 in some games (Colin McRae DiRT especially.)

After I bought Stalker on release day I didn't buy any brand new releases for at least six months. Then I went and got some PC games just for the sake of it to make my outlay feel worthwhile.

Had I decided not to buy that rig, I would've been happy with a £500 office type PC.

 

Unfortunately Leper, I have to agree with Fod. With a console the developers don't have to think about what the max resolution is going to be, they just design for the 1080i HD TV (for a HD game, ordinary PAL for the non-HD games) and then work on the gameplay (hopefully...). They don't have to optimise for nVidia or ATi, they don't have to work with different sound cards, processor speeds, memory sizes and storage locations. All the developers have to do is say that they are developing for the PS3/Wii/Xbox and they know what the specs are going to be.

Yes, the PC can do lots of things, but it is expensive to get. I've just shelled out a large chunk of money for a computer that is the current high end. In 6 months time, it will be mainstream. I've got a Wii at home that is over a year old. It is still the best thing available for the casual gamer, it costs about £180 (I got mine free, so I don't know how much it cost back then). My sister-in-law has a year old PS3. That is still high-end. It cost about £300-400. My new rig is costing me three times that. I've saved for it and I know the risks and benefits of paying that much. I also know that in less than two years, I won't be able to play the latest games on the max settings any more. A PS3/Xbox/Wii owner will have all the eye candy turned on and won't have to think about upgrading their graphics cards.

When was the last time you heard a PS2/3 gamer complaining that they had to turn down the settings to medium or lower, just to get decent frame rates?

Andy

 

Leper, you touched on the subject of game prices. Consoles make money on the strength of their games. It's said that Sony, in particular, sold consoles at a loss, but the sheer amount of games sold helped them slacken their belts. That's why you'll find, a lot more often than not, console games are dearer than PC games. The cost of PC gaming is upfront, you have to pay a lot more out initially to get a good system, but then pay less per game.

 

I have to agree. I just spent $650 upgrading my PC ($400 on a new mobo, RAM, video card and PSU; and $250 on a new monitor). I could have bought a 360 and a bung of games for that. Unfortunately I do not have an HDTV. That is why I have not bothered with the current gen consoles. I wanted a WII for a while, but I have played it quite a bit at a friends house and many of the games have lost their appeal to me. You can only play WII Bowling so many times before your getting a strike 8/10 times, then it is just not fun.

When I finally get a HDTV I was a PS3 simply for it's media capabilities. I would like to find a 60gig, get a new HD and use it as a media center and to play my older PS2 games upscaled.

 

I suppose it is horses for courses but i wouldn't consider a console great value.
As you've said you can get a productivity pc for £200 so we could deduct that from the value of the machine My pc is a three year old platform with the cpu upgraded with a second hand dual core 939 athlon x2 whole thing inc graphics card wouldn't have cost me £400. When you consider the parts i have sold on after upgrades and deduct the £200 for the cheap pc section its cheaper or as cheap as a new ps3 and much cheaper than a launch console. Its much faster than the cheap dell so photoshop 3d studio etc are actually usable, plus it has the advantage of being more capable for longer.
Thats before a decent TV and rember i can play this when i want and don't have to fight with the tv watchers.

 

what's your point? Pc is more expensive, we all know that, what does this have to do with anything? For the price of a console and a office PC most people have, u can have a high end PC that does a lot more then gaming. Plus u don't get mods and customization u get on PC, a fine trade off for it being more expensive, u get more. U get what u pay for.

A wii is a Casual gamers system they do not have to think about upgrading tis graphics because they already look 4 years old. The trade off is the graphics pale in comparison, why comapre a wii, a casual gamers sytem to a PC? Apples and oranges. Hell, u a can get more casual games on the web then the wii can even dream of.

What happens when console games have bad performance (See Dark messiah, mass effect, Lost Odyssey, etc.....), u are stuck with it.

No one is debating price, yes Pc is more expenisve, why leep mentioning that? We are saying despite that it si a healthy market, and the sales growth proves that.

 

When you can get console games for £20 six months after release I don't think the argument that console games are too expensive holds up.

I think the problem is that games used to be developed with the mid range hardware in mind, and scaled up for the high end, and down for the low end - wheras now games seem to be developed for the highest end then scaled down for everyone else. Whilst this means that a game is 'up to date' for a longer period, as the users hardware catches up to the games potential graphics, most gamers play a game when its newly out whether their hardware can really manage it or not, and are unlikely to go back to a game just to see what they should have seen the first time around.

With consoles, if a big game launches you can guarantee that when you talk about it with friends you've all had roughly the same experience, wheras with PCs that can't really be said.

For some people it even seems the latest and most graphically taxing games seem to be a way to validate their purhase of expensive hardware, where the graphics, and the ability to turn everything to max is more important than their experience of the game itself.

 

Not one person has said consoles are more expensive, lol, just that the gap between PC and console is not near as big as some make out. also, u Can't get ant Good, A quailty titles on console for $20 in 6 months.

why do people keep going on about PC being more expensive and having to upgrade? Pc has always been like this and is doing fine, has nothing to do with the notion Pc gaming is dying, sales are growing. PC has always been a Niche market for enthusiast, People who like upgrading, know how to use a PC, nothing has changed. Pc is a different market, seperate from consoles, when will people understand this. There is a reason many pc exclusives continue to get made and hundreds of games are in development as we speak for the platform. The notion Pc gaming is somehow dying, or slaes getting lower is a fallacy.